🔗 Share this article Why 2026 Will Be a Year Like No Other for the Indian Sun Mission A coronal mass ejection can be several times larger than our planet For India's first solar observatory, 2026 is expected to be like no other. This marks the initial occasion the spacecraft – which was placed into space last year – can watch our star during the peak of its solar cycle. According to scientific data, it comes approximately once every 11 years as the Sun's magnetic poles flip – the Earth equivalent would be the North and South poles changing places. It's a time of great turbulence. It involves the Sun changing from calm to stormy and is marked by a significant rise in the frequency of solar eruptions and massive solar flares – massive bubbles of fire that erupt of the Sun's outermost layer. Made up of charged particles, a coronal mass ejection may have a mass of billions of tons and can attain velocities exceeding 2,000 miles each second. It can head out in any direction, even toward our planet. At top speed, the journey takes an ejection 15 hours to cover the 150 million km Earth-Sun distance. "In the normal or low-activity times, the Sun emits a few solar eruptions a day," explains a leading scientist. "Next year, it's anticipated there will be over ten each day." Researching CMEs is one of the key research goals of India's first solar observatory. One, as these eruptions provide an opportunity to learn about the star at the centre of our planetary system, and two, since events occurring on the Sun threaten infrastructure on Earth and in orbit. The aurora borealis lit up the night sky over the US last autumn Effects on Our Planet and Space Infrastructure Coronal mass ejections rarely pose a direct threat to human life, but they do affect our planet by causing geomagnetic storms that impact the weather in near space, where about 11,000 satellites, including Indian satellites, are stationed. "The most spectacular displays from solar eruptions are auroras, which are direct evidence that solar particles from Sun journey to Earth," the scientist explains. "But they can also make all the electronics on a satellite fail, knock down electrical networks and affect weather and communication satellites." Past Solar Incidents The most powerful solar event in history occurred during the Carrington Event which knocked out telegraph lines across the globe During 1989, sections of Quebec's power grid was knocked out, affecting millions in darkness for nine hours In November 2015, solar activity disturbed flight operations, leading to chaos across Scandinavia and various European airports Recently in 2022, an ejection caused dozens of spacecraft failing If we are able to see what happens on the Sun's corona and detect a solar storm or a coronal mass ejection as it happens, measure its heat at origin and watch its trajectory, it can work as a forewarning to shut down power grids and satellites redirecting them to safety. The solar atmosphere can be seen during a total solar eclipse from Earth The Mission's Unique Advantage There are other space observatories watching the Sun, India's spacecraft holds an edge compared to rivals when it comes to studying the solar atmosphere. "Aditya-L1's coronagraph has perfect dimensions enabling it to effectively simulate the Moon, fully covering the solar disk and allowing it an uninterrupted view of almost all solar atmosphere 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, even during solar events," notes the researcher. Essentially, this instrument functions as a synthetic eclipse, obscuring the Sun's bright surface allowing scientists continuously observe its faint outer corona – a feat natural eclipses provide only during specific moments. Moreover, it's unique capable of examining eruptions using optical wavelengths, letting it measure a CME's temperature and heat energy – crucial data indicating the intensity a CME would be if it headed our direction. Readiness for Maximum Activity To prepare for the upcoming peak solar activity period, researchers collaborated to study the data obtained from a major CMEs recorded by the mission has observed recently. It originated in September 2024 at 00:30 GMT. Its mass was 270 million tonnes – for comparison that struck the ship was 1.5 million tonnes. At origin, the heat reached extreme levels with energy equivalent comparable to millions of tons of TNT – in comparison nuclear weapons on Hiroshima and Nagasaki were 15 kilotons in scale respectively. Even though the numbers make it sound incredibly large, the scientist describes it as a "medium-sized" one. The asteroid that eliminated the dinosaurs on our planet was 100 million megatons and during the Sun's maximum activity cycle, we could see CMEs with energy content matching even more than that. "I consider the CME we evaluated happened during periods was in the normal activity phase. Now this sets the benchmark for future comparison to evaluate what is in store during solar maximum occurs," he says. "The learnings from this will assist in developing protective measures to be adopted safeguarding spacecraft in orbit. Additionally, they'll aid us gain a better understanding of near-Earth space," he adds.